Children and adolescents in Toronto who are victims of abuse have long been subject to onerous investigations involving multiple agencies and locations and the need to retell their horrific stories over and over again.

That will all become much easier now with the opening of Toronto’s first Child and Youth Advocacy Centre, a single location that provides all the needed services — from initial reporting to medical exams to police investigations.

“Disclosing physical or sexual abuse is one of the most difficult things for a child to have to do, and going through the system is incredibly difficult. As professionals, we have a responsibility to make that as less traumatic, as easy, as comfortable as possible for children,” said Karyn Kennedy, executive director of BOOST, which houses the centre at 890 Yonge St.

Kennedy was speaking at an event celebrating the centre’s launch Monday, which included presentation of the $50,000 Ruth Atkinson Hindmarsh Award provided by the Hindmarsh family and the Atkinson Charitable Foundation, which is historically connected with the Toronto Star.

An animated video shown at the event illustrates the flaws in the current system: In the clip, a 5-year-old child named Robin tells her teacher she is being abused at home. Robin must then visit several counsellors, the police station, the hospital, and so on, eventually becoming overwhelmed and re-victimized through the process.

In addition to better serving victims, Kennedy said, the centralized approach is likely to lead to higher conviction rates. A justice department report suggests there isn’t enough evidence to show such centres are responsible for higher rates, but Kennedy points to the example of the Zebra Child Protection Centre in Edmonton. That city saw a rise in conviction rates from 25 per cent in 2001 to 86 per cent in 2008, after adopting the multidisciplinary model.

Authorities in Toronto deal with 1,500 child abuse cases every year. While there are more than 800 child and youth centres in the United States, Canada has only 15.